Hockey Juha Nurminen started his first day at work and didn’t know exactly what he had done – “But I wouldn’t change a day afterwards”

Surprise was quite when the Chinese Olympic team’s fresh coach Juha Nurminen waited for the arrival of the puck players at Vuokatti Sports College at the end of September 2018.

Nurminen was about to get a crew of potential national team players from China’s reigning champion Qiqihar. However, they did not appear anywhere.

“They never got there when they didn’t have visas for a friend of the hockey association, who came there alone after all,” Nurminen recalls at the beginning of the national team.

Eventually, players arrived with backing forces in early October. The age range of the group did not extend until 17 years of age Yan Ruinanista all the way to a 39-year-old veteran.

“I jumped into the completely unknown. There was no idea what kind of guy would come from there. When the first rosters came, I watched from Elite Prospects that these have been at least at the World Cup. ”

China was already playing in Division 2A of the World Cup at the time, the fourth highest level in national team hockey. In addition to the actual World Championships, the competitions in Divisions 1A and 1B are higher.

“

“Some were then such that no athlete could be appointed under any name.”

Vuokatti the Olympic coaching center provided the Chinese with a framework to train towards the ongoing Beijing Olympics. The multicolored crowd began their journey to the five-ring race right from the start.

“The first thing that needed to be fixed was learning to practice and getting yourself in shape.”

Nurminen says that the team’s younger guard also had players in good condition.

“Some of them were then such that you couldn’t be called an athlete by any means now, but would the oxygen uptake values ​​and the like go to the level of even such a basic citizen. It was set in motion. ”

On the other hand, Nurminen noticed that his defenders could play in the offensive direction. He recalls that the ten-minute three-on-three game played in the first practice ended at 9-8.

“It went from head to toe, and the net rang all the time. There was no smell of defensive play”Nurminen laughs.

“

“I was never allowed to speak Finnish with a Finnish journalist at the World Championships.”

Hockey players practiced Four times a day. It was visible – for example, the result of the curve skating test improved from the back of three seconds to the average level of the A-youth, ie those under 20 years of age, in a couple of months.

“Yes, there was a desire to practice there, but of course it is not easy if the basics are not in principle,” says Nurminen.

“The day started in the morning and ended at six or seven in the evening. It’s not quite an easy set for someone who doesn’t have any ground condition. It took a lot of thinking about what to do to keep them together. ”

Nurminen was on the payroll of the Vuokatti Olympic Training Center when he started the project. However, the salary came from China. When Nurminen became the pilot of the A national team called the Dragons, he was given a new contract.

Coaching the Chinese cross-country team Glenn Lindholm told HS in an interview published at the end of January 25-page employment contract. It determines what is allowed to be said and what is not.

“Yes, all of them sound familiar. There were just these things to say and things not to say, and everything is checked. The screen is hard, ”says Nurminen.

China is not known as a model country for human rights or freedom of speech, which Nurminen also noticed during his work.

“I never had to speak Finnish with a Finnish journalist at the World Championships, but I always had to speak English. The interpreter was next door and translated it for our GM, who still wanted to check the texts. ”

“Yes, it surprised the media, and of course at the beginning, but yes, it learned along the way that this is how it goes. When you work with the Chinese, you are not necessarily given a free hand, ”he adds.

In Vuokatti, Nurminen worked with a female interpreter with a hockey background. However, this remained in Kainuu with the Chinese women’s hockey players when Nurminen left for Beijing. There a new interpreter was waiting for him.

“I don’t know where they had dug him from. He had no smell about hockey – he was a mechanical engineer by profession, ”says Nurminen.

The interpreter, who studied in the United States, spoke good English and traveled everywhere with Nurminen, but since knowledge of the species was non-existent, no misunderstandings were avoided.

“

“While I was in China, he learned to skate because he was forced to have skates on his feet.”

Career development however, it is sometimes fast, as the story of a mechanical engineer shows.

“I don’t know if he’s still an interpreter in the national team’s operations. At some point in the U20, he had even been named second coach at some point that he must have learned something then, ”says Nurminen.

“While I was in China, he learned to skate because he was forced to have skates on his foot. It was a bit shaky at the beginning, but then he started with water lines at the end of it. ”

Nurminen did not talk directly with the players because of the language barrier. Living in North America Ying Rudi and Chen Zimeng were among the few English masters at the World Championships.

“There were practically two or three of them there. Vuokatti was not exactly as much as the one who had been playing in the Yankees for a year. He spoke inadequate English, ”Nurminen recalls.

He spent virtually the entire spring of 2019 in China, ending the World Cup in Serbia.

Coronavirus prevented the World Cup from being played the following season, and the national team practically did not operate at any level due to the pandemic.

Nurminen was to continue the project with the Chinese. He says he heard about discussions that Chinese men were supposed to play in the Finland series. Women were planned for Mestis.

“There were such throws in the air, but in the end, the Chinese made such a turn in the summer that they sent the team to the Czech Republic. They played under the name Golden Dragon, ”says Nurminen.

“

“I announced that there is nothing to Mestis about that team.”

The Golden Dragons took their place on the Czech level. He worked as a coach Jiří Šejbaand appointed Ambassador of China Jaromír Jágrin owned by Rytíři Kladno was strongly involved in the activities of the club.

“Their wish all along was that that team could have played for Mest. I announced that there is nothing to Mestis about that team, ”says Nurminen.

The sharpest tip of the Chinese players would have been able to play from Mest, but these players would by no means have come to Finland to play.

“

“It’s all that can be torn from the coach.”

At the Olympics China is represented by seven players coached by Nurminen: the goalkeeper Han Pengfeidefenders Yan Ruinan, Zhang Pengfei and Chen Zimeng and strikers Ying Rudi, Zhang Zesen and Xiang Xudong.

China is the latest in the International Hockey Federation’s IIHF in the world rankings only in 32nd place.

The team is composed exclusively of Kunlun Red Star KHL players. 16 of them were born outside China.

“Even though they have received confirmations, they will have a tough job against the world’s leading countries,” Nurminen knows.

“When we start building on the foundation, it is not possible to rise from the top 30 to the top 12 in such a short time, no matter what kind of talent. It’s a little too long. ”

According to statistics, Nurminen had 255 male hockey players and about 1,900 juniors when he started his wash. Nowadays there are already more than 1,200 male players. The total number of players has broken the limit of 13,000 enthusiasts.

Helsinki Nurminen, who bred IFK and played in more than 200 Finnish Championship matches at IFK, Reipas Lahti and Kiekko-Espoo, is currently working as the second coach of the Kajaani Hockey Mestis team.

He will answer Pasi Räsänen in the coaching team led by the defenders about the defensive play and the game of underpower.

“There will be 40 hours more working time a week in the head coach of China. Everything that can only be torn from the coach is sucked in there, ”Nurminen compares.

“It wasn’t an easy project, but I wouldn’t switch off a day like this in retrospect. It was positive to see how far they went. ”

Nurminen, who moved from the Espoo Blues A-youth academy team to the rudder of China at the time, says that he tried to get Yan Ruinan to stay in Hok’s A and B youth when the other national team left for Beijing.

“Ruinan was clearly a talent. Hokki took care of everything he needed to play in Finland with his peers, but the Chinese Hockey Association forced him back to China, ”says Nurminen.

“It was also made an international transfer, but they never put a stamp and a name on it. It was so close. The race hockey in Finland would certainly have taken us forward, but now he is playing in KHL. ”

Space olympics free newsletter hs.fi/newsletters.

Read all olympics from hs.fi/olympics.